Be kind to your veterinary staff

Tonight, I’m working one of my two swing/overnight shifts a week. I’m doing what I love. I’m a veterinary technician at an emergency hospital, and helping animals is my passion in life. This job is one of the most fulfilling jobs I can do, and I fully intend to continue taking care of animals in some aspect for the rest of my life.

Like I said, I love my job. But sometimes I really hate it. Like tonight. Tonight, I spent 15 minutes in a room with a patient we had just euthanized. I sat in there crying, because this patient was a year old and was diagnosed with leukemia earlier that day. I had to help two new dog owners deal with their grief and failure to understand what they could have possibly done to deserve something like this. I couldn’t start crying in front of them, because it’s my job to be strong and remind them they’re doing the best thing they can for their pet, which they absolutely were. But hell, I wanted to sit down and cry with them. Because the answer is, they didn’t do anything except be a perfect dog owner. No, I never saw them at home, I don’t actually know how they took care of their dog, but I do know how their dog looked at the owners when it was scared and confused. I know that this dog found comfort being in the same room as these two people, and didn’t even want to come into the building until it’s owners said it was okay. So yeah, I know they were the perfect dog owners for that dog. And they didn’t deserve this. They deserved years and years of a dog that loved and trusted them. Instead, they got a couple months, and there’s nothing I can say or do to help them handle that grief. I can’t explain to them how it’s not their fault, and they were perfect for their dog, but they were. So I cried. Once they were gone, I cried and I cried, and then I got up and did my job all over again.

All of this was going on while another family was learning the dire condition their young puppy was in. A puppy that was completely happy and healthy when they dropped it off for surgery, who the doctors were now worried wouldn’t make it through the night. Again, I wanted to cry with them. So badly. I wanted to hug them and cry and tell them that it was all going to be alright.

But that’s not my job. My job is to try my best to help the doctors help these animals. But sometimes my best is recognizing when helping the animal means ending its suffering, even if it’s only a year old. And when that happens, my best is helping the owners understand that they’re doing the right thing. It sucks. I know we can’t save them all. But I want to. I wish I could. And I don’t think people understand that.

Almost every day, someone at work gets at least one client who accuses us of only being in the business for money. We see online reviews of people claiming we don’t care, we just want to steal money from pet owners. Do you really think if I was in this for the money I would be living in my parents in law apartment? Do you think my coworkers would be struggling through student loans? We don’t make a lot of money in this field, that’s a well known fact. We do this because we want to help animals. And more than that, we want to help owners help their animals. They’re not children, they can’t speak to us or point at where they hurt. Yeah, it’s expensive to run tests and do imaging. Trust me, I know, my dog just got sedated xrays, and even with the discount I get at work, it was pricey. But that’s not why we do this. We don’t upcharge everything because we want to, we charge how much we need to to be able to stay open and continue helping you and your animals.

So next time you go to the vet, and your staff seems a little stressed out, instead of pointing it out, take a second to thank them. When they’re going over an estimate with you for a potentially hefty bill, remember that they hate asking you for that much money as much as you hate paying it. And mostly, when you think they don’t care about what you’re going through with your pet because they don’t show too many emotions, just remember that they’re running to the back room to cry as soon as you’re gone.

Mental health disorders in this field are so commonplace. It’s because of how stressful and genuinely sad some parts of our job are. It’s because of the many hours we put in, even after our shifts have ended. It’s because of all of our patients that are the reason we don’t sleep at night, because we’re hoping and praying they’ll still be there when we come in the next day. It’s because of the verbal abuse we know we’re going to face from some of our clients, because we see them at some of the worst and scariest points of their lives.

But we’re trying. We are always doing our best for you and your pets. Even if you don’t see it all the time, just remember we do this for the love of animals and for the love of animals only.